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It seems to me they're agreements signed under duress. The convict will be freed if he signs. If he refuses to sign, he will be kept in prison. How is that any different than pointing a gun at someone and telling him to sign a document? The fact that the government is willing to agree to the plea implies that they're aware they've been holding an innocent person falsely convicted, and are furthering the crime against that person by using that false conviction to coerce a plea from that person.
It seems to me they're agreements signed under duress. The convict will be freed if he signs. If he refuses to sign, he will be kept in prison. How is that any different than pointing a gun at someone and telling him to sign a document? The fact that the government is willing to agree to the plea implies that they're aware they've been holding an innocent person falsely convicted, and are furthering the crime against that person by using that false conviction to coerce a plea from that person.
plea agreements are not for convicts. they are for people who have bee arrested.
plea agreements are not for convicts. they are for people who have bee arrested.
Alford pleas have been used with convicts who had already served many years in prison. New evidence was found and it became clear there were mistakes and wrongdoing by the prosecution, and that the convict was probably innocent. But if they waited for the case to work its way through the courts, they would have to remain in prison during those years. The Alford plea lets them get out immediately, but makes the prosecution immune from lawsuits.
It seems the same to me as if a sheriff seized $100,000 on the theory that it might be drug money, but with no evidence other than the existence of the money. And gave the owner of the money the choice, to either spend several years and $50,000 on legal fees to get the money back, or agree to let the sheriff keep $25,000 for his own personal use and get the money back immediately.
eok - You just described a perfect shakedown racket perpetrated by the police of far too many of our police. The Sheriff's Department should NEVER be allowed to keep confiscated property.
IMHO - If a person has been falsely convicted the government should not only release the person and return any of the confiscated property they should pay the person for his lost wages and potential investments. The settlements should be large enough to discourage false persecutions created by incompetent government.
eok - You just described a perfect shakedown racket perpetrated by the police of far too many of our police. The Sheriff's Department should NEVER be allowed to keep confiscated property.
IMHO - If a person has been falsely convicted the government should not only release the person and return any of the confiscated property they should pay the person for his lost wages and potential investments. The settlements should be large enough to discourage false persecutions created by incompetent government.
Confiscations and seizures and the government's insane "forfeiture" laws are a separate issue and have nothing to do with Alford pleas--which, BTW, are not used soley for purposes described in the post above yours.
An Alford plea is, for all intents and purposes, a conviction.
An Alford plea leads to a conviction. It is one of three ways a conviction can be reached. (Trial verdict, plea agreement or Alford plea.)
One of the most stable statistics in criminal justice is that 92% of all criminal cases end in a negotiated settlement (a guilty plea to something or an Alford plea to something). Of the remaining 8% where the defendant refuses a negotiated settlement, about 87% of those cases end in conviction at either a bench trial or a jury trial.
A typical guilty plea (accepting responsibility) includes an allocution, where the defendant acknowledges he did 'the bad act.' In the federal system, the defendant receives a 2 or 3 point reduction at sentencing for 'acceptance of responsibility.'
An Alford plea is different in that the defendant does not have to allocute. He just acknowledges that the government has enough evidence to obtain a conviction should the matter go to trial. I have met many, many defendants who cannot bring themselves to confess what they did in a public setting. One guy I busted I had about 60 hours of videotape of him committing the crime, but he still could not bring himself to admit it. For them, the Alford plea is the least painful way forward. I don't recall whether they get the downward departure for acceptance of responsibility, but the court typicaly takes into consideration that the defendant did not force the government to foot the expense of a trial.
One last point - I've never seen a prosecutor offer an Alford plea. (One district where I brought a case strongly discouraged Alfords almost to the point of it being policy.) Every time I've seen one discussed, the defense attorney brought it up.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Delahanty
Confiscations and seizures and the government's insane "forfeiture" laws are a separate issue and have nothing to do with Alford pleas--which, BTW, are not used soley for purposes described in the post above yours.
An Alford plea is, for all intents and purposes, a conviction.
Have Alford pleas replaced pleas of Nolo Contendere or do they have significant differences?
An Alford plea leads to a conviction. It is one of three ways a conviction can be reached. (Trial verdict, plea agreement or Alford plea.)
One of the most stable statistics in criminal justice is that 92% of all criminal cases end in a negotiated settlement (a guilty plea to something or an Alford plea to something). Of the remaining 8% where the defendant refuses a negotiated settlement, about 87% of those cases end in conviction at either a bench trial or a jury trial.
A typical guilty plea (accepting responsibility) includes an allocution, where the defendant acknowledges he did 'the bad act.' In the federal system, the defendant receives a 2 or 3 point reduction at sentencing for 'acceptance of responsibility.'
An Alford plea is different in that the defendant does not have to allocute. He just acknowledges that the government has enough evidence to obtain a conviction should the matter go to trial. I have met many, many defendants who cannot bring themselves to confess what they did in a public setting. One guy I busted I had about 60 hours of videotape of him committing the crime, but he still could not bring himself to admit it. For them, the Alford plea is the least painful way forward. I don't recall whether they get the downward departure for acceptance of responsibility, but the court typicaly takes into consideration that the defendant did not force the government to foot the expense of a trial.
One last point - I've never seen a prosecutor offer an Alford plea. (One district where I brought a case strongly discouraged Alfords almost to the point of it being policy.) Every time I've seen one discussed, the defense attorney brought it up.
The prosecution proposed an Alford plea in the West Memphis Three case. The prosecution knew they couldn't win on retrial but also knew they could keep the defendants in prison while awaiting a new trial so they got them to agree to an Alford plea and they were released the same day. It was BS, but the case was bad from the start and in most parts of the US they never would have been convicted.
The government should be immune from lawsuits anyway. That would make the point moot, wouldn't it?
Not if the government committed a crime, violated someone's rights or agents of the government ranging from LEO, prosecutors and/or investigators conspired to get an innocent person convicted or commited perjury in a court of law.
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